Inside Gymnastics’ Terin Humphrey interview

“I had accomplished all my goals [in gymnastics] and there wasn’t anything left.”

In a new interview posted on Inside Gymnastics Magazine’s website, recently retired Alabama senior Terin Humphrey is perfectly candid. Among other things, she discloses that she really wanted to quit after the Athens Olympics, even forgoing her NCAA eligibility.

The first part of the interview is online, a teaser for Inside Gymnastics’ May/June issue.

INSIDE: Looking back at your career, what are you the most proud of?

HUMPHREY: I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately. There is so much that I’m so proud of. But I think the biggest thing is that I stuck around for almost 20 years to begin with. I was gonna’ be done after the Olympics. I WANTED to be done, actually.

They asked Humphrey whether she thought everything — the years of training, the surgeries, the pain, the expectations — were worth it. The response was undeniably honest.

HUMPHREY: You know, I’ve debated that in my head a couple of times. I think that, just to have the scholarship, it would have been worth it. I think that now.

There are six girls every four years [that make it to the Olympics]. It is basically impossible to get where I was. [Since I did make it,] it’s hard for me to say if it would have been worth it. At this point, I think so. [Four years ago?] Who knows?